The stupid believe that to be truthful is easy; only the artist, the great artist, knows how difficult it is.

There are some things you learn best in calm, and some in storm.

Success is never so interesting as struggle

Of all the bewildering things about a new country, the absence of human landmarks is one of the most depressing and disheartening.

The sky was a midnight-blue, like warm, deep, blue water, and the moon seemed to lie on it like a water-lily, floating forward with an invisible current.

The fact that I was a girl never damaged my ambitions to be a pope or an emperor.

It takes a great deal of experience to become natural.

Winter lies too long in country towns; hangs on until it is stale and shabby, old and sullen.

Elsewhere the sky is the roof of the world; but here the earth was the floor of the sky.

The end is nothing; the road is all.

Most of the basic material a writer works with is acquired before the age of fifteen.

When God's favour and Godly flavour is in you, your haters will taste wisdom and the only thing they can do is to regret ever tasting a sweet thing.

Never fear to make mistakes

We need to laugh at the irrationality of evil, for in doing so we deny evil's power over us, diminish its influence in the world, and tarnish the allure it has for some people.

Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason so few engage in it.

I was enjoying the great human trophy hunt and, looking back, it scares the hell out of me

I need one more bass less.

Poetry for me is as much a spiritual practice as sexual ecstasy is.

White people on Facebook, I discovered by reading people's messages and walls, tended to lurk and judge.

The people who encouraged me weren't necessarily writers or readers themselves. They were people who were just pleased to see me devote my life to reading and writing.

Let your gun therefore be your constant companion of your walks.